Chapter 12
CAROLINE
Caroline hurried to the starting line, taking a spot at the end.
“Shall you make an announcement ending your campaign?” Her tone was playful, but her heart battered against her chest mercilessly as she climbed into the sack.
Mr. Yorke’s head whipped around, and his mouth stretched into the widest grin she had yet seen him wear. “I will make an announcement, pack up my things, and leave at once. On my honor as a gentleman.”
“Good,” Caroline said, even though the prospect of him leaving Trelowen made her stomach tighten and swim.
“And you will dance with me if I win?”
She smiled. “Can you not manage to secure a second set with a woman without duress, Mr. Yorke?”
“Ready, set, go!” Jory yelled out.
They were the last off the line.
Caroline grasped the edges of the sack and hopped forward, landing just shy of the place Mr. Yorke reached with his own hop.
The crowd’s cheers were drowned out by the sound of her pulse and the rhythmic thud of her hops. She had one thing on her mind and one thing only: to win. To see Mr. Yorke, so infuriatingly confident, finally lose. To prove she didn’t want him there.
To her satisfaction, she managed to keep abreast of him as they hopped behind the other participants, sand being kicked up around their sack-covered knees and ankles. Caroline had a vague curiosity over Eliza’s performance, but she pushed it aside selfishly, her eyes on her goal.
Her shoulder bumped Mr. Yorke’s as they tried to keep their balance and maintain their pace. Her previous thought came to mind—to push him.
But, no. She wanted to win fairly.
For all the intensity in her mind and body, and despite the rivalry, she found herself laughing, and Mr. Yorke too. Mr. Yorke stumbled, and she inched ahead, the taste of impending victory surging through her veins, making her feel alive as she never had before.
With but a few hops left in the race, she glanced over at her rival.
The same vivacity shone from his face, but there was something more there—something more intense as he slipped farther behind, the gap between them growing slightly.
Her heart surged.
He was going to lose.
And when he left Trelowen, he would take with him the strange aliveness she had felt for the past two and a half weeks.
Would she ever see him again? It was unlikely.
Her next hop stalled. Just a fraction. Just a breath.
Just enough.
Mr. Yorke took three great hops, passed her, and fell across the finish line, while Caroline came tumbling after.
The crowds cheered, and Caroline turned away from Mr. Yorke to see Jory holding his arms up in victory.
Breath coming hard and fast, Caroline clapped, but her mind was elsewhere.
Mr. Yorke had won. And she had let him. She’d had the chance to eliminate him from the election and from Trelowen, and she had hesitated.
She let her sack drop to the sand and carefully stepped out of it, aware that Mr. Yorke was doing the same just beside her. “Well done.” She picked up the sack and stood straight.
He did not respond immediately, brushing the sand from his shirt sleeves, then running a hand through his hair. Only then did he look at her.
The glint in his eyes made her pulse race.
“You let me win.” His chest rose and fell with his breath. His shirt was askew, the skin at the top of his chest visible and sprinkled generously with sand.
Caroline tried and failed to catch her own breath. “You were about to let me win.”
He merely met her gaze, saying nothing but, she feared, understanding everything she least wanted him to understand.
She had agreed to the race to show him she did not want him in Trelowen, and instead, she had given him—and herself—confirmation that she did.
Perhaps if he were teasing her for it, she would be able to engage with her own cutting repartee, but instead, he simply continued to regard her silently, as though he was trying to decide what to make of her.
“You did it!” Eliza called out, coming over with a face wreathed in smiles and pink at the cheeks. “I had no idea you had even joined. What made you decide to?”
Caroline held Mr. Yorke’s gaze a moment longer. “A moment of madness, no doubt.”
“Time ’as come, Mr. Yorke.” A fisherman named Ruan strode toward him. “Unless ’ee didn’t mean what ’ee said yesterday…”
“Of course I meant it,” Mr. Yorke responded. “But I require some instruction on the rules, for I have never wrassled before.”
“Ah,” Ruan said. “’Tis a proper sport, sir. Two men in jackets tryin’ to throw the other clean on his back—both shoulders touchin’ the ground, or it don’t count. No punchin’, no kickin’. All skill and footwork.”
Mr. Yorke listened to this with a slight frown. “May I watch a round?”
“Course,” Ruan replied genially. “Only follow me.”
Caroline and Eliza shared a significant glance. Sack racing and rope wrestling were harmless enough. Wrassling was rough and brutal—and Mr. Yorke entirely green.
The two of them followed behind Mr. Yorke and Ruan. A circle of people had formed on the side of the beach near the stairs, and with a few words, they parted enough for the wrassling to be seen.
Two men wearing the same, light-colored jackets tussled, their large arms gripping one another. Caroline had only seen wrassling once before, but the memory of a man being lifted in the air, then slammed onto his back was not one she would soon forget.
She winced as the man farther from her was thrown, imagining the same thing happening to Mr. Yorke, who stood just in front of her, watching with a pensive hand covering his mouth.
Was he afraid? Caroline found it difficult to imagine. Mr. Yorke was always so calm. So self-possessed. So confident. Overly so, perhaps.
And yet, how could he not fear such a fate?
“I think I understand the general way of it.” He rolled up his sleeves, revealing a pair of capable forearms. “Who am I to wrassle?”
“Me.” The deep voice cut through the crowd as a large, burly fellow stepped forward.
Mr. Yorke’s brows went up, a flicker of misgiving on his face. “Ah. Jago.” He cleared his throat. “Very good.”
Caroline stared at the competitor with apprehension. He was many inches taller—and wider—than Mr. Yorke.
She took Mr. Yorke by the arm, and he turned toward her, a hint of surprise in his face.
“I do not think it wise of you to do this,” she said in a low voice. “There is no need for it.”
“On the contrary, my lady,” he said. “I gave these men—and you—my word that I would wrassle them.”
“What in the world possessed you to do such a thing?”
He smiled, his eyes narrowing slightly. “Are you worried for my safety, my lady?”
She let out an incredulous laugh and released his arm. “Only your sanity. If you do not regard the value of your life, I certainly shan’t.”
His smile grew, and he took a step closer until she could see the little grains of sand on his cheeks and in his brows. “Your concern moves me, my lady. I shall endeavor to allay your fears with my performance.”
“Are ’ee comin’, Mr. Yorke?”
His mischievous gaze held hers for one more moment, then he turned away.
“A rare man he is,” Eliza said, shaking her head with an appreciative smile.
“Thank heaven for that.” Caroline watched him don one of the jackets with her pulse thrumming in her veins.
The jacket, which wrapped and tied at the front, was large on him, where his challenger, named Jago, barely fit into his.
They tied their jackets and faced one another in the circle drawn in the sand. The two of them circled one another for a moment, their gazes intent, though Jago wore something very near to a smile that struck another quiver of nerves through Caroline.
And then they were grappling, hands gripping each other’s jackets, heads down as they continued turning. Jago bore forward suddenly, and Mr. Yorke stumbled backwards. He adjusted quickly and dug his feet in.
The audience was quiet, the fiddler’s instrument and bow resting at his side as he watched intently.
Mr. Yorke twisted suddenly, wrapping his leg behind Jago’s knee. He may as well have done it to a boulder.
Caroline’s fingernails dug into her palms.
Jago grunted, then wrenched Mr. Yorke upward.
His feet left the ground as he rose into the air, suspended for a moment.
His arms released Jago, flailing as though seeking purchase anywhere that didn’t intend him harm.
The next moment, his back hit the sand with a thud that made half the crowd suck in a breath through their teeth.
Caroline’s hand flew to her mouth.
Mr. Yorke’s head was turned to the side, concealing his face from her. He lay still for a moment that stretched an eon.
“Should we help him?” Eliza asked.
Caroline grasped her skirts and hurried over, her throat strangled until Mr. Yorke began to stir.
Jago put out a hand, and he took it.
Caroline winced at the strength with which Jago pulled him to his feet, as though Mr. Yorke had not just been beaten like a rug.
“Well done,” Mr. Yorke said, shaking Jago’s hand with a slight wince.
Jago grunted, then waited for his next opponent.
Mr. Yorke turned away, took a few steps, and swayed slightly, blinking quickly as though the world was unsteady.
Caroline hurried over and took him by the arm.
“You, Mr. Yorke, are a fool,” she said in breathy annoyance as she guided him through the crowd, which was already focused on Jago’s next challenger. “You should count yourself fortunate that you will live to see another day.”
He chuckled, but he was leaning on her more than expected.
She glanced at him, and her heart flipped. “You are bleeding.”
He brushed the back of his hand at his brow. “It is only a scratch,” he said, flinching at the contact.
“More foolishness,” Caroline said. “It must be seen to. Mrs. Tonkin!”
“I shall fetch her,” Eliza said, hurrying away.
A minute later, Mrs. Tonkin bustled over, a grim look on her face.
“Mr. Yorke has an injury that needs attendance,” Caroline said.